Boxee And Hulu Trade Blows In Congressional Hearing
The relationship between Boxee and Hulu has been strained ever since early 2009, when Hulu suddenly and unexpectedly removed its content from being available to Boxee users. If you're not aware, Boxee is merely a software overlay that acts as a portal to web content; it essentially opens content from web sites the same way a typical web browser would, but for whatever reason, Boxee claims that NBC Universal (who owns Hulu content) requested that all Hulu content be yanked from Boxee. Strangely, not much has
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Walton Chaintech SSD Converter Makes Two CF Cards Act As Your Hard Drive
Here's one thing we can all agree on: SSDs are awesome, and far superior to HDDs in almost every scenario imaginable. Here's another we can agree on: SSDs are still priced far too high for most to give them a second glance. For years now, solid state storage has been breaking benchmarks left and right, but SSDs are still considered a niche product because of the prohibitive pricing surrounding them. In order to bring SSD-like performance to your next computer without you having to actually pony up and pay for
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Sony Interested In Entering Tablet PC Space, Taking On Apple
It was only a matter of time. We knew as early as CES 2010 that slate/tablet PCs were back on track for a second wind after dying out years ago, but it seems that an unlikely contender has boosted everyone else into overdrive. Apple's iPad is the first real tablet to launch this market into the next gear, and with companies like NVIDIA, Asus and Dell also looking to get involved, we figured that Sony would be close behind. In a conference held in Tokyo, Sony's CEO Nobuyuki Oneda exclaimed that his company was
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Google's Super Bowl Ad Leaks Early: A Story Of Love & Search
We can't exactly say that hell has frozen over here, as Google has actually went against its unofficial no-ad policy at least once before. But then again, that whole ordeal was something entirely different than this. We've known that the search engine giant (and now operating system contender) has been looking into the TV ad business for some time, but it has yet to come forward with a splash as big as the one you'll probably see tonight. That is, if you're watching the single biggest sporting event of the US
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The Death Of The Battery Is Upon Us: Plastic Supercapacitor Could Recharge Gizmos
Battery life has been a huge issue around these parts. Particularly when it comes to notebooks, it always feels like manufacturers are giving us rough life estimates that are nowhere near accurate when compared to real-world figures. From R/C cars to notebooks to cars, there's no question that batteries are necessary in the world of technology, but they're also amongst the most annoying aspects due to their inability to stay charged for a remarkably long time and their tendency to degrade over time. Not to mention
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Shocker: Consumers Hate Waiting For Slow Web Sites
Well, wouldn't you know it? Consumers hate, hate, hate waiting for web pages to load, and they have no sympathy whatsoever if the site is being hammered during a "peak time." That's the conclusion drawn by a soon-to-be-published survey by Gomez, which found that while consumers were more than willing to wait in long checkout lines in retail stores during the holidays, they had little to no patience for waiting in digital checkout lines as sites get slammed during the end-of-year rush. A curious world we live,
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Google's Super Bowl Ad Leaks Early: A Story Of Love & Search
We can't exactly say that hell has frozen over here, as Google has actually went against its unofficial no-ad policy at least once before. But then again, that whole ordeal was something entirely different than this. We've known that the search engine giant (and now operating system contender) has been looking into the TV ad business for some time, but it has yet to come forward with a splash as big as the one you'll probably see tonight. That is, if you're watching the single biggest sporting event of the US sporting calendar.If rumors are correct, Google will air a Super Bowl ad of their own tonight. It will be a 30 second spot, and it will likely air during the 3rd quarter of play. The Super Bowl is one of those weird events where the public actually looks forward to watching the ads, and this year looks to be a great one for geeks. Google won't be the only Super Bowl ad related to consumer electronics; Intel is also planning a commercial of their own, but that one has yet to leak.
This ad, as is typical of Google, is really simple. It's as far from flashy as an ad could be, but it's incredibly hard to look away from. Simple yet engrossing, and it works. It tugs at the heartstrings, and it spells out in 30 seconds exactly why we personally have fallen in love with Google over the years. Have a look below if you're into spoilers; otherwise, just wait for the ad to roll naturally tonight on CBS.
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The Death Of The Battery Is Upon Us: Plastic Supercapacitor Could Recharge Gizmos
Battery life has been a huge issue around these parts. Particularlywhen it comes to notebooks, it always feels like manufacturers aregiving us rough life estimates that are nowhere near accurate whencompared to real-world figures. From R/C cars to notebooks to cars,there's no question that batteries are necessary in the world oftechnology, but they're also amongst the most annoying aspects due totheir inability to stay charged for a remarkably long time and theirtendency to degrade over time. Not to mention they're bad for theplanet, expensive and unreliable.Batteries may be the perfect example of a love/hate relationship, butthat whole "hate" aspect could be vanishing in the future. ImperialCollege in London has a team of researchers that are making waves nowthanks to their latest development. The project seems tightly connectedwith Volvo, but the implications are far more amazing than just helpinga hybrid rely less on conventional heavy battery packs. The newinvention isn't actually a "battery." Instead, it's a supercapacitor.Basically, this composite (sort of like a plastic) could be used tostore and send out energy much in the same way as a battery, but sinceit's plastic, the actual casings of devices could be the battery itself.
Imagine a fender being used to help power a hybrid vehicle. Or maybethe casing of your next iPod could take the place of the bulky batteryin the back. Or maybe your next ultraportable or netbook could use theenclosure itself as the battery rather than that bulky cell in therear. It's definitely a game-changing concept, and amazingly, it's notreally new. Supercapacitors have been around in science labs for years,but no one has really taken the initiative to mold and shape the ideainto one that could be used to power our next generation ofelectronics.
The college is hoping to one day see mobile phones as thin as creditcards thanks to the ability to run without a conventional battery, andthis same technology could be used to make hybrid cars lighter and morefuel efficient, not to mention cutting back the use of harmful batterymaterials. The project co-ordinator, Dr Emile Greenhalgh, from the Department of Aeronautics at Imperial College London, says:
“We are really excited about the potential of this new technology.We think the car of the future could be drawing power from its roof,its bonnet or even the door, thanks to our new composite material. Eventhe Sat Nav could be powered by its own casing. The future applicationsfor this material don’t stop there – you might have a mobile phone thatis as thin as a credit card because it no longer needs a bulky battery,or a laptop that can draw energy from its casing so it can run for alonger time without recharging. We’re at the first stage of thisproject and there is a long way to go, but we think our compositematerial shows real promise.â€
At this point, it's still not clear when this technology would beable to used in typical consumer electronics. It's obviously far tooconceptual and expensive to simply implement now, and lots of testingwill probably have to be done to see if this could actually replacebatteries. Assuming all that works out, we'd be delighted to see thedeath of the battery. We've been dealing with degrading battery cellsfor far too long, and it's about time that we could wake up onChristmas morning and not have it ruined by the phrase "Oh! I forgotthe batteries!" Hopefully that fateful day is now sooner (much sooner)than it was before this innovation.
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Shocker: Consumers Hate Waiting For Slow Web Sites
Well, wouldn't you know it? Consumers hate, hate, hate waiting for web pages to load, and they have no sympathy whatsoever if the site is being hammered during a "peak time." That's the conclusion drawn by a soon-to-be-published survey by Gomez, which found that while consumers were more than willing to wait in long checkout lines in retail stores during the holidays, they had little to no patience for waiting in digital checkout lines as sites get slammed during the end-of-year rush. A curious world we live, yes?
The survey, which was conducted in December of 2009, found that the vast majority of consumers expected web pages to load quickly regardless of what time of year the site was visited, and that goes for travel, retail and most any other type of "serious" site. If it's a business, and it's online, consumers expect near-instant page loads. Anything less, and all sorts of bad things begin to happen.
The Gomez survey had the following findings:
- A third of online shoppers had a bad experience on a retail Web site during the recent 2009 Holiday shopping season and 15 percent found the problem to be “unacceptable.â€
- These bad online experiences caused nearly one in five online shoppers to shop at another site.
- In general, 41 percent of online shoppers will only tolerate one or two bad online experiences before abandoning a retailer’s Web site.
credit:آ Gomez Inc
Around 1500 people were consulted for the study, each of which were familiar with conducting online transactions during "peak" periods. Over 2/3rds of those polled said that they had no more tolerance for slow page loads for peak times compared to normal times, and 78% of the group said that they would click over to competing sites if they encountered slow page loads or other associated errors. Even more startling was this: 88% of those questioned said that they would be less likely to return to a slow performing site, with most of them admitting that they had other options and thus no real need to stick around and wait things out.
Are you one of those impatient ones?آ Do you give a site a second chance if they're slammed during a peak season?آ How much tolerance do you have sites that load sluggishly?
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Samsung First to Offer SSD Full Disk Encryption
Full Disk Encryption Comes to Solid State DrivesLee, MA and San Jose, CA: Wave Systems Corp. and Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., have collaborated to give professionals on the go the ultimate in hard drive security. Along with blazing speed, ultra-fast boot-up and silent operation, Samsung's new self-encrypting SSDs automatically encrypt information as it's saved to the drive, an industry first for SSDs.
Full disk encryption (FDE) has already been adopted as a standard feature available in many commercial laptop and desktop systems with hard disk drives. Samsung self-encrypting drives - 256-, 128- and 64-gigabyte SSDs - provide FDE bundled with Wave's EMBASSY management software and are now available through at least one major OEM.
"Samsung has combined the tremendous performance advantages of solid state technology with integrated hardware encryption for drives designed especially for today's 'road warrior' professionals," said Jim Elliott, memory vice president, Samsung Semiconductor, Inc. "Business users now get the best of performance and security in a single drive."
Samsung's new 256GB, 128GB, and 64GB SSDs are the first solid state drives to incorporate hardware-based encryption, which has made headlines in recent weeks with publication of the industry's Opal storage specification published by the Trusted Computing Group (TCG). Benefits of hardware encryption over today's software-only encryption approaches include faster performance, better security and an "always on" feature. Because encryption keys and access credentials are generated and stored within the drive hardware, they never leave its confines and are never held in the operating system or by application software. This hardware FDE approach is considered more secure and less complex to manage.
"Samsung is breaking new ground in performance and security with its solid state FDE drives," said Steven Sprague, Wave’s president and CEO. "Whether it's with cars or computers, many people will always demand the very best in performance and Samsung is delivering on that promise. With self-encrypting drives, users have the peace of mind that whatever's on the drive—credit card numbers, medical records, sensitive personal data or intellectual property is always protected."
Each Samsung self-encrypting SSD, when ordered in a new computer, now comes bundled with Wave's EMBASSY Trusted Drive Manager for complete life cycle management of the drive including pre-boot authentication to the drive and enrolling drive administrators and users. Trusted Drive Manager also enables the backup of drive credentials.
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